Canada's volleyball women winless in 3 after being swept by Netherlands in Italy
Dutch have won 4 in a row and sit 4th in Volleyball Nations League with 7-2 record
Make it nine consecutive lost sets for the Canadian women in Rimini, Italy.
The Netherlands extended its win streak to four on Tuesday with a 3-0 sweep (25-19, 25-12, 25-21) and moved into fourth place in Volleyball Nations League with a 7-2 record.
"We are finding our ground as a team," Canada outside hitter Hilary Howe told Volleyball World. "It's been a tough week for us. Last week we had some successes, so we were coming into this one with confidence and feeling good, but now we had some close sets and some battles.
"I think we've learned a lot this week to come out stronger next week."
WATCH | Canada drops 3rd straight to fall to 14th in 16-team VNL:
The Canadians, making their VNL debut, haven't won since taking a 2-0 lead over Poland on Sunday. On Monday, Japan beat Canada for its fifth sweep in eight matches.
Canada, which falls to 14th in the 16-team league at 2-7, is off until Saturday when it faces eighth-place Serbia (4-4) in a match CBCSports.ca will live stream at 12 p.m. ET.
WATCH | Japan sweeps Canada in preliminary round:
The Dutch squad outpointed Canada 44-34 on the attack Tuesday, held a 12-4 edge in blocking and delivered four aces.
"It was a really difficult match," Nika Daalderop said. "We had to fight a lot and I'm really happy we won. We had a late game yesterday [beating Poland 3-2 and] it was tough to recharge for this morning.
The Netherlands made the final six in the first year of Volleyball Nations League in 2018 but dropped to 11th the following year.
Captain Anne Buijs had a team-leading 15 points against Canada while Lohuis, VNL's most efficient server in 2019 with 24 aces, added 12.
Howe and Andrea Mitrovic topped the Canadians with nine and points, respectively.
The 15-match preliminary round runs until June 23 with the top four countries advancing to the semifinals and finals.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
